Text 12610, 131 rader
Skriven 2006-08-19 09:19:38 av /m (1:379/45)
  Kommentar till text 12523 av /m (1:379/45)
Ärende: Re: Apple thrashes Dell on Mac Pro pricing
==================================================
From: /m <mike@barkto.com>



http://daringfireball.net/2006/08/jackass_paul_thurrott

===
Paul Thurrott has published a price comparison between the Mac Pro and Dell
Precision workstations, with the goal of configuring “two nearly identical
systems as cheaply as possibleö. His original post, now corrected, showed the
Dell coming out cheaper, but he inexplicably configured the Dell with a cheaper
processor in that comparison. In the updated post, with both systems configured
with 3.0 GHz Xeon CPUs, the Mac Pro comes out $500 cheaper. But even still, he
has configured the Dell as a (cheaper) 32-bit system, justifying it thusly:

   Note: A number of readers suggested I configure the Dell as
   a 64-bit workstation. While that's possible, that’s not exactly
   a mainstream configuration these days on the Windows side.

Ordinarily, this wouldn't quite be enough to garner Jackass of the Week honors
(especially since Tiger, the shipping version of Mac OS X, only offers 64-bit
support at the POSIX layer). What puts Thurrott over the top is the hypocrisy
of his "64-bit isn’t mainstream on Windows" justification. Last week, regarding
the vastly improved 64-bit support in Mac OS X 10.5 announced at WWDC, Thurrott
himself wrote:

   Thanks to the 64-bit Xeon chip that will be shipping in
   the new Mac Pro systems, Leopard will be fully 64-bit
   enabled (unlike Tiger, which is only partially 64-bit and
   then only on certain Power PC [sic] systems). That means
   that OS X will finally do what Windows XP x64 Edition did
   last year: Run 32-bit and 64-bit applications natively,
   side-by-side. Good for them.

So when the feature was announced at WWDC, it was a catch-up feature that
Thurrott claims put Apple two years behind Microsoft. But when it would have
made Dell look even worse in a side-by-side pricing comparison, it’s "not
exactly a mainstream configuration"....
===

  /m



On Sat, 12 Aug 2006 10:47:42 -0400, /m <mike@barkto.com> wrote:

>
>http://www.theinquirer.net/default.aspx?article=33576
>
>===
>THE MAC PRO was unveiled at the Apple Worldwide Developers Conference
>(WDCC) a couple of days ago. It's a formidable system, based around a
>two Intel Xeon 'Woodcrest' processor dual core system, similar to what
>Dell is offering within the Dell Precision 490 range for small
>businesses.
>
>We thought it would be interesting to compare pricing between similarly
>specced systems from Dell and Apple, and were gobsmacked at the results
>- this should be very good reading for Apple advocates after our
>previous commentary, which discussed the poor showing from Apple at this
>year's WDCC.
>
>Let's get the base specifications out of the way first, so it's clear
>the systems are very similarly specified. Considering the recent Apple
>move towards Intel architecture, the specs are almost indistinguishable:
>
>Dell base specs
>-Dell Precision 490
>--Graphics Card - 128MB PCIe nVidia Quadro NVS 285
>--Memory - 1GB, DDR2 SDRAM 533MHz, ECC (2x512MB DIMMS)
>--HDD - 160GB 7200RPM S-ATA
>--Optical - 16X DVD+/-RW drive
>--KB/Mouse - USB Entry Quietkey, Dell standard USB
>    2-Button Optical Mouse
>--Sound and Firewire- Onboard AC97 sound and 1394a Controller Card
>--No monitor
>--Three year onsite economy service & support
>
>Apple base specs
>-Mac Pro
>--NVIDIA GeForce 7300 GT 256MB
>--Memory - 1GB, DDR2 SDRAM 533MHz, ECC (2x512MB DIMMS)
>--HDD - 160GB 7200RPM S-ATA
>--Optical - Superdrive dual-layer DVD+/-RW drive
>--KB/Mouse - Apple Keyboard and Apple Mighty Mouse
>--Sound and Firewire - FireWire 800/400 and sound with
>    various I/O inc. optical
>--No monitor
>--One year standard AppleCare
>
>Now let's take a look at different processor configurations and the
>resulting pricing from the US stores.
>
>Dual Core Intel Xeon 2GHz x 2 (4MB shared L2 cache)
>Dell: $2,086.00 (with a $200 discount for small business)
>Apple: $2,124.00
>
>Dual Core Intel Xeon 2.66GHz x 2 (4MB shared L2 cache)
>Dell: $2,866.00 (with a $200 discount for small business)
>Apple: $2,424.00
>
>Dual Core Intel Xeon 3GHz x 2 (4MB shared L2 cache)
>Dell: $3,686.00 (with a $200 discount for small business)
>Apple: $3,224.00
>
>You can see Dell pips Apple by a tiny $38 for the 2GHz option, but then
>is whipped into shape by Apple with a $442 saving on the 2.66GHz option
>and a similarly large margin with the 3ghz processors - $462 per system.
>It must be noted that the machine from Dell does have a three year
>on-site warranty whereas the Apple has only the one year, but this is
>less important to small businesses who have their own IT support, and
>consumers who wish to get the cheapest deal - something Dell usually
>wins hands down.
>
>This is quite incredible. Any major OEM has trouble matching pricing
>with Dell, considering the massive volume discount Dell gets from Intel.
>But Apple aren't only matching them on the lower specs, they're
>thrashing them on the higher specced systems - relatively huge margins
>of pricing difference.
>
>You have to wonder what sort of discounts Apple are getting from Intel,
>and if this is why Dell is now holding hands with AMD. æ
>===
>
>
>gobsmacked???
>
>  /m

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